


Tied To You

by Humansunshine



Series: WLW Fic Bingo 2019 [4]
Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: F/F, Ghost Clary Fray, Grief/Mourning, Resurrection, True Love, Unbury Your Gays, compulsory heterosexuality, immortal gays
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-28
Updated: 2019-07-28
Packaged: 2020-07-24 00:28:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20017267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Humansunshine/pseuds/Humansunshine
Summary: Clary's soul is trapped, tied to Izzy. How can she move on when there's so much left unsaid?





	Tied To You

**Author's Note:**

> This is for the shadowhunters wlw fic bingo, filling the 'ghost/human AU' square for team blue! After the angst feast last time, I had to give you a happy ending this time! I said fuck clace lives and fuck the bury your gays trope!
> 
> Trigger warnings for death: Clary is dead at the beginning of this fic, and for most of it she appears as a ghost
> 
> Grief/mourning: We see Izzy, Jace, Magnus and Alec mourning for Clary

When Clary woke up, she was floating in a very white room. She turned over in the air, looking over her hands. They were runeless, so how was she flying? As she looked down at herself, she noticed a shock of red hair on the bed below her, and with a jolt she realised that it was her body lying on a hospital bed. There were several doctors and nurses stood around the bed.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” one doctor said, “it’s like her body is missing something that it needed to survive, but… Iron levels are fine, oxygen levels, glucose levels… Everything is perfect. There’s no reason why her body would give up.”

Clary knew what her body had been missing. Apparently, the angels’ decision to take away her runes and angel blood had left her mundane body unable to cope. It had been a death sentence. Strangely, Clary wasn’t too disturbed by it. At least she remembered her life in the shadow world, this way. She could watch over her friends. 

One moment Clary was musing about her new ghost life, and the next she was floating near the ceiling of a familiar room. When she looked down she recognised Izzy’s bedroom, her heart leaping when she saw Izzy herself sitting at her dresser. Izzy’s fingers were gently resting against a photo frame, and Clary wriggled around to try to get a better angle, curious. As she got closer she saw that Izzy had tears on her cheeks, and instinctively she reached out to put her hand on Izzy’s shoulder, but her hand fell through. She couldn’t touch her. 

“I should’ve told you while you were here,” Izzy whispered, shaking her head. “I’m sorry, Clary. I should’ve said it.”

“Should’ve said what?” Clary asked, tilting her head to the side. How had she gotten here? Had Izzy summoned her? It didn’t seem like Izzy was doing any kind of ritual. It was strange; Clary felt an irrepressible desperation at the thought that she’d missed when Izzy had said right before she materialised. 

Clary floated down to sit on Izzy’s dresser, wondering what it all meant. The stories went that ghosts stuck around to resolve unfinished business, and all the legends were supposed to be true. But Clary had tied up her life in the shadow world pretty neatly, considering she only had a day to do it. Letters written to Jace, Izzy, Alec and Magnus explaining what had happened, instructions for them to move on, to leave her to live her mundane life in peace, and go on protecting the shadow world without her, in her memory.

Of course, she hadn’t realised that she’d die. She wondered if Izzy and the others knew. 

Izzy moved away from the dresser, workout clothes in her hands. As she started to get undressed, Clary floated towards the door with the intention to go and check on Jace, but once she’d passed through Izzy’s bedroom door she found that she couldn’t go any further. She could feel a tug at her centre, right where her bellybutton was, like there was some invisible string fastened there, keeping her from wandering off. As Clary pulled on it, she suddenly found that she could move away from Izzy’s room again, but before she could get much further she was jarred to a halt once more. When she turned around Izzy was locking the door of her bedroom. 

As Izzy turned away from where Clary was floating, presumably to head towards the training centre, Clary was pulled along behind her, forced to follow Izzy at a distance of about 10 metres. As hard as she tried to get away, Clary couldn’t get far away from Izzy. The invisible string she could feel, she realised, was tied to Izzy.

But why?

They weren’t far from the training centre when Izzy’s phone started to ring. When Izzy picked it up, Clary heard Alec’s panicked voice on the other side of the line, though she couldn’t make out the words.

“You’re meant to be on your honeymoon,” Izzy said, her eyebrows furrowing, “what’s so important that you had to-?” 

Whatever Alec told her must have been terrible news, because Izzy’s knees went weak, her hand reaching out to catch herself on the wall.

“That can’t be true, it’s not her, it can’t be.” Izzy insisted. “Clary got turned back into a mundane, she said, she’s safe. It can’t be her, Alec, it’s not possible.”

Clary came a little closer, her eyebrows furrowing. “I’m okay, Iz, it’s alright,” she murmured, wishing that Izzy could hear her. 

Izzy gasped and turned around, her eyes wide. Clary moved back a little. Had Izzy heard her? “Yeah,” she said into the phone, “I’ll meet you at the morgue.” Once she hung up the phone, Izzy reached her hand out towards where Clary had just been standing, and Clary moved back into its path, disappointment flooding through her when Izzy’s hand passed right through her chest. 

Of course it wasn’t that easy.

Travelling by portal as a ghost was unpleasant, to say the least. It was like being sucked up by a vacuum cleaner. Clary stuck close to Izzy as she tried to get her bearings back, her head scrambled from the travel. Alec and Jace were there to give Izzy tight hugs. Clary felt strange looking at Jace. He looked terrible; his eyes were red rimmed and he looked like he hadn’t slept or showered since Clary had seen him at the wedding, but Clary didn’t feel the pull that she’d felt towards him in life. In theory, she felt sorry for him, but she didn’t quite feel it. It was like that feeling was a ghost, not her. Clary’s eyes returned again and again to Izzy, who was trying to comfort Jace. 

“They’re ready,” Magnus said from down the hall, and disappeared into a room. The Lightwood siblings all looked at each with varying degrees of sadness and sympathy, and Clary floated along behind them as they followed Magnus into the room and crowded around the viewing table where Clary’s body lay with a sheet over it. 

“I can’t do this,” Jace said quietly, taking a step back. “I can’t. I have to…”

“We can do this, you don’t have to be here,” Alec told him gently, squeezing his shoulder. “Go wait outside, it’ll be alright.”

Jace sniffed and turned to go, walking quickly out of the room and back down the hall. Izzy was hugging herself tightly, her hands restlessly brushing up and down her biceps. Magnus pulled back the sheet, his face anguished.

“Oh, Biscuit,” he whispered, shaking his head. “I should have protected you.”

“You couldn’t have done anything,” Clary insisted, her eyes on Izzy, who looked about two seconds from crumbling. As Izzy let out a muffled sob, Magnus reached out to Alec, gripping his hand tightly. 

“What is it, Magnus?” 

“Shush. Be quiet. I think I just heard…” He was looking around the room, his glamour dropped. “Clary… If you’re here… Speak to me.”

Clary straightened up. “Magnus, I’m here. I’m okay. Tell Izzy that I’m okay.”

Magnus looked right at her, and if Clary still had a heartbeat, it would’ve frozen. “What are you still doing here?”

“Magnus, what’s going on?” Alec asked, and Magnus shushed him. 

“I don’t know,” Clary answered, “I’m stuck to Izzy, I found her right after she said something to me, and I feel like I need to hear it. It’s like this… Yearning.”

Magnus’ eyes moved to Izzy, who had tears streaming down her face. “Alec, I need you to leave the room.”

“What? Why?” Alec asked defensively.

“Just…” Magnus gave him a hard look. “Do it.”

Alec put his hands up and left the room, closing the door behind him. Once he’d gone, Magnus came around the table to put his hands on Izzy’s shoulders. 

“You need to tell Clary how you feel.” He told her, and Izzy shook her head, her hands coming up to cover her face. 

“I c-can’t,” she sobbed, “Jace…”

“Isabelle,” Magnus said seriously, “she needs to hear it. She wants to hear it. Her soul is crying out, it needs to resolve a deep, deep magic inside of it.”

Izzy sniffed, trying to get herself together. “What magic?” 

“The greatest magic there is,” Magnus smiled slightly, “true love.”

As Magnus said the words, Clary felt the truth of them. She’d always felt so close to Izzy, from the moment they met. When she fought with Izzy, there was a gut-wrenching pain that didn’t come close to any loss she’d experienced. She wanted more than anything, before she’d lost her runes, to become parabatai with Izzy, to bind their souls…

“Oh my God,” Clary whispered, “Izzy, I love you.”

With a gentle, encouraging squeeze from Magnus, Izzy turned to look down at Clary’s body. “Clary… I love you.” She said thickly, her fingers touching Clary’s cheek.

Travelling through the portal had nothing on the sensation of being sucked back into her body. One moment Clary was floating opposite Izzy and Magnus, and the next she felt a rush of air and a shock of breath as she sat up on the table, within her body once more. 

“Biscuit!” Magnus laughed, tears sparkling in his eyes. 

Clary only had eyes for Izzy. “You… All this time?” 

“H-how did you-?” Izzy asked breathlessly, her eyes wide with disbelief. 

“With your residual Heavenly Fire energy-”

“I don’t care,” Izzy insisted as Magnus started to explain, running her fingers through Clary’s hair. 

Clary leaned close. “All this time?” 

Izzy swallowed hard, nodding. “And you?” 

“It took me dying to realise it,” Clary huffed out a laugh, “but yeah. Yeah, I do.” She reached out, curling her hand around the back of Izzy’s neck to pull her into a kiss that tasted like salt and Izzy’s lipstick.


End file.
